No matter how much she runs, Laura is stuck in an endless loop of her past. With a transfer of school and a curly-haired boy who seems to be wherever she goes, it's a matter of time she realizes that her universe ceases at the sight of him-and runni...
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IT RAINED THE ENTIRE NIGHT, AND I FOUND MYSELF CONSCIOUS ENOUGH TO KNOW IT. By the time sunlight had found its way into my room, I was wide awake, anxiety crawling under my skin and picking it apart. I had checked my phone too many times to count. Restlessness ruled over any rationality. I felt physically ill. Not sleeping did not help.
I missed mom.
I reread the only message Evan had sent me. Did you get home safe? I had replied, but I wasn't sure if he'd seen it.
My heart was a jackhammer. As I spent the early hours of the morning, laid in bed, I realized how less I'd lived in my own skin, how much I lived in my mind.
When Liam sat across me on the coach with a bowl of cereal, I was afraid he knew. He always, always knew, because no matter how hard I tried, whatever I felt mirrored on my face to his eyes.
Silence stretched between us. As I gradually looked over to him, chest constricting in trepidation, he was long staring. The sort of glare which only materialized for serious conversations, ones we used to have a lot of before we moved. Ones where he used to lecture me around and give me advices I didn't need.
How many of those conversations had we missed since we moved here?
I couldn't keep up with the stare-fest, so I pretended to be searching for the TV remote. He sighed. "Laura."
I still didn't bother looking up. It wouldn't be easy to lie if he forced me to look at him.
Thankfully, he didn't. "Are you doing okay?"
It was that question, in particular, that pulled my heart apart and let it sit bare, bleeding. If I looked him in the eye right now, the chances of breaking were far too high—something I couldn't afford to do. Not after everything. Not after yesterday. "Yeah."
I probably should've said yeah,why?, but then he would've reasoned, and his arguments would've been indisputable against my falsities. "School's all good?"
"Yep."
"How about the job?"
"Fine." I hadn't been on my past two shifts, but Sophia managed to adjust that.
I found the remote and switched on the TV. A news channel popped up, which I muted. Suddenly, my actions seemed incredulous, because he knew my purpose for switching on the television was never watching it but for letting the noise fall in the background like static.
Now I'd muted it and I wasn't even trying to act this bizarre and yet I was and now his eyes were narrowed to slits. My heart plunged.
"You know monosyllabic answers will just make me question more."
"I'm fine, Li," I grumbled, shutting down the T.V. "Everything's fine. Is this you taking a weekly report for mom?"
He paused with a hand in the air. "No." He restrained himself from saying something I could almost hear. Don't just walk away. Sit. Talk. You've come so far. He kept quiet, though. But it still hurt, probably more than it would've if he'd just spit it out."I just. . .wanted to talk."
